


Mercy

by Ilthit



Category: Raffles - E. W. Hornung
Genre: Additional Warnings Apply, Ficlet, Gen, Guilt, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Introspection, Wordcount: 100-500
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-27
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-03 20:15:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2886146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilthit/pseuds/Ilthit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a prompt by Ruby on Tumblr, Bunny's post-Knees of the Gods guilt-tripping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mercy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rubynye](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/gifts).



> Additional warning for suicide mention.

One likes to think of oneself as man of some integrity, even after one’s conscience has taken enough blows to hang by a mere thread. In our first innings, the years of our most shameless indulgence when Raffles was the pride of England’s cricket and I best known as his constant companion, I made excuses for myself, much as I’d excused the gambling that led me to Raffles’s door in the first place. In our second, when he had been broken by Italy and I by Wormwood Scrubs, I professed a cold indifference to law, society, and guilt itself. Now that he is gone and with him any temptation to burgle, how could I appease my conscience?

It returned with a vengeance as soon as the tendrils of grief had begun to loosen their grip on me. I have spilled our secrets on these pages to secure a pitiful income, an open confessional before the public eye. I said I did what I did because I loved him; I would not have done it had I not loved him, at least not after that first fateful foray into which he tricked me. I might have been an honest man. I might as well say that I did what I did because I was weak; had I been stronger, I would have been found floating in the Thames not long after that night. 

My friend, with whom I have recently reconnected to my astonishment and pleasure, forgives me as completely as I forgive my Raffles. It may take some time before I can afford as much mercy towards my own wretched self.


End file.
